Monday, November 06, 2006

Declaring the time of death on the Greenpoint scandal

Boy, that escalated quickly!

At this point, I believe I speak for all Boob Tubers when I say it is time to move on from Langliebgate 2006. We've made our stance clear, and so have a multitude of commenters with varying levels of humor and eloquence. The comments section for our last entry has begun to take a nasty turn, so we declare a moratorium on that topic. Feel free to continue leaving your thoughts, but do not expect a repsonse from us.

Please stay tuned as we go back to writing about what we know best, television. Jeanette will be posting shortly about the Law and Order behemoth, and there probably won't be any references to Detective Benson hot on the trail of a Polish crime ring.

31 comments:

Yo, boobtubers. I believe you said something about being hunted down. Well, I think you and this idiot Langlieb should know that certain efforts have been already made. Don't forget that there are a few Poles who work at the Greenpoint police station and the post office. And they are equally offended, so getting the exact address is not a problem. Maybe moving to Williamsburg is not such a bad idea.

I agree, don't threat the Boobtubers. What if they get really scared and close their blog down? It would be such a loss for the humankind...But seriously, Boobtubers, don't you understand that the Langlieb story was your five minutes of (questionable) fame? Look at all your other entries - the amount of comments for each of them varies between 0 and 4 - that's including your responses. The truth is - nobody reads your shit. Why? Because it's worthless.So if I were you, I'd try to surf the Langlieb wave for as long as possible. Because it's not gonna last very long. Unless of course some overzealous Polish youth dislocates his jaw.

As much as our policy of Supportsploitation vis-a-vis Langlieb has upped our daily hits, we hope that people will come for the scandal and stay for the TV mockery. I hope to one day have people threaten my life over my stance on a Sawyer-Kate relationship on Lost.

And by the by, it's not hard to track an IP address... continued threats of violence will be taken seriously and brought to the attention of the authorities, though apparently not the Polish ones who are already gunning for us.

OK Alanna, and what about our meal? I'm surprised that you respond to all those anonymous comments, but choose to ignore me. I hope that you guys are the men (or women) of your word and the invitation is still open.

http://www.brandonbird.com/svutines.htmlUnfortunately the Valentines sold out last year, but at least they're available as $25 prints. I am deeply considering purchasing the "I 'HUANG' TO BE WITH YOU!". For serious.

Congratulations on the amount of comments for your new entry... C'mon friends and family of boobtubers (probably the only readers), drop a line there or else the girls are gonna cry. No talent, no sense of humor, no courage - you guys SUCK...

woah behold, david has apologized. i knew you could do it david. way to be a man and accept responsibility for your actions. america is short on these kind of people. i personally accept your apology and am very proud of you. however, if i were you, i would hold off on making your facebook account public again, i think some people out there still dont like you.

david's apology:

"I would like to apologize to anyone offendedby my essay, which I wrote as a privatecitizen, not as a City employee, for mycollege's alumni magazine. My intention wasto write a work of satire that wouldillustrate the negative influence of young,aloof people who move to Greenpoint fromother areas and try to assert their way oflife on a strong, cohesive immigrantcommunity. I was attempting to write satirein the historic tradition of Jonathan Swiftand others who have used satire as a toolfor social commentary. In doing so, I wasnot sufficiently sensitive to the power ofhistorical stereotypes, even when invoked forthe purpose of satire.

I am half-Polish myself - my late grandparentsare from Bialystok. I have lived inGreenpoint since graduating college, and loveits people (many of them immigrants fromPoland, Italy and other countries),restaurants, shops, and energy. I love thatGreenpoint's children play under the watchfuleyes of their families and neighbors all hoursof the day and night. I love that on Saturdaymornings, Manhattan Avenue is so alive withpeople that it can be hard to find room on thesidewalk. And I love that there is no placequite like it in New York - from the concertsat Warsaw nightclub to the fresh sausage atthe meat markets.

Again, I am sorry for any pain my articlecaused. It was always my intention to defendthe wonderful community of Greenpoint from theforces of economic and social change, andnever my intention to offend. I ask for yourforgiveness.

Apology?! First of all - too late. Secondly - it's obvious, that the c...sucker is trying to keep his job, if anything (just read the first sentence). Went to work on Monday and had a talk with his boss...

that apology actually sounds kind of sincere. this whole thing has gotten out of hand. his boss has its own problems with racism, (although i've been scoffed at for bringing it up) and probably doesn't need any more bad publicity. what a rude awakening it must be to realize you are part of the problem instead of the solution.

Thanks, Anon. Well put. I can assure you the apology is beyond sincere. Langlieb loves Greenpoint. And also, very good to bring up the point of being part of the problem instead of the solution. His sole intention was always to be part of the latter.

Also, as far as talent goes, I can wiggle my ears and cross one eye at a time. And Viv, another Boob Tuber, can imitate a cat's meow really accurately. THE BOOB TUBERS ARE FLUSH WITH TALENT, MY ANON FRIEND.

Dear Boobtubers, unfortunately the quality of your responses seems to go drastically down. Why do you even bother answering to all those anonymous comments? This is the last time I visit your blog, I'm afraid. Good luck.

I'm a little hurt that you're ditching us after we offered you a delicious e-meal, Maurycy. You could have at least brought a bottle of wine to the event, but we overlooked that. And now you're just throwing our generosity back in our faces. Well, that's the last time we cook for comments.

Hey Boobtubers, I just wanna say that when I read David's "satire" I was honestly uncomfortable and a little hurt (I was born in Poland, live in the US now), even though I recognized the piece as aimed at gentrification, and not really the Polish people of Greenpoint. I just didn't get the need for the Polish "jokes" and not-so-nice descriptions. They were unnecessary to get the point across and they really took away from a noble message. They were simply not funny (and I've been reading some of your stuff; it's funny!) Unfortunately, many of us, myself, my friends, my parents, and their friends, hear things like that regularly, and they are NOT meant to be funny. Anyway, I'm sure I speak for many Polish Americans (those represented by some of the obnoxious anyonymous people here excluded) when I say that I think David did a great thing by simply admitting that "I wasnot sufficiently sensitive to the power ofhistorical stereotypes, even when invoked forthe purpose of satire". Most importantly, I don't think such a satire belongs in a publication like an alumni magazine, and I hold them more responsible for this. I'm disppointed that they have let him take all the heat.

Anonymous, you are by far my favorite Anon of them all. You totally get it. David [stubbornly] did not anticipate that the use of such strong language would have outcomes beyond the positive one he was anticipating. He was very wrong to think everyone would get it, but I think people like drama and got too hotheaded, forgetting that David himself is Polish! What frustrated me as an "insider" to this whole thing was that David actually loves his neighborhood and neighbors so much, a point that was hard to convey to people caught up in the matter. He meant every word of his apology, and perhaps the Haverford alumni magazine should have a stronger editorial staff. I am sorry if you felt offended, but I am thankful for your grasp and feelings on the situation and think they are truly the best sentiments anyone could have, all things considered. It makes me wish I belonged to your nationality (I am part Lithuanian, can that count?)

David has apologized for his comments about the Polish community of Greenpoint, and expressed his regret that he offended anyone. And his comments were intended to be satirical, despite how they were construed. You, however, have made several outright anti-Semitic remarks that are not couched in any kind of self-awareness or satirical tone. Dave comes out of this looking like a man who can admit when he's made a mistake, and you look like a bigoted chump.

If you persist in making these statements against Jewish people, I'll be forced to begin screening comments. And I really have better things to do with my time.

Calm down baby. That's exactly the reaction I was hoping for. It looks like finally something starts to click in you little brain. Freedom of speech is one thing, but it ends right when it begins to offend someone. So next time, when you decide to publicly support someone's racially biased opinions - think twice. As to having better things to do with your time - I'm not so sure about that. If you did, you wouldn't be running this pitiful blog.

In response to a comment left at http://justsayin2000.blogspot.com/2006/11/jews-sayin-2000-pt-1.html , we here at JustSayin reserve the right to comment on this issue further. Just because David (and I am somebody you know, by the way, not just somebody who claims to know DL) has apologized does not mean we can't use this as a conduit to discuss broader issues of prejudice or issues related to Jewish identity.

We ARE NOT MILKING this. If you have read through any of our blog entries that are older than a week, you would have seen that we have a broad reach in terms of themes- we just write what we know and what's current. Excuse me for underestimating the transformative effect that ambulance chasing could have on my BLOG career, but I just don't see it that way. I referenced our blog once on the Gothamist comment section because nobody had weighed in with an opinion who was familiar with the background of the writer and the magazine. I'm sorry it won't just go away because David apologized.

If you would have actually read the post, it was conceived in reaction to anti-semitism which was kicked up in the aftermath. Does that sound like opportunistic exploitation of the situation, or does it sound like a reasonable topic to be discussed based on the traffic which we saw coming into our blog from google searches which carried disturbing key words?

We do not need permission to make any statements on this matter, nor do we intend to ask for them. If you want to talk to us about it, get my number from Seabass.